


Stopping By

by missema



Series: Kirkwall Tech [15]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Conversations, F/M, Family, Family Fluff, Kirkwall (Dragon Age), Kirkwall Tech, Tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-29
Updated: 2017-10-29
Packaged: 2019-01-25 22:18:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12542440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missema/pseuds/missema
Summary: Sebastian runs into Leandra at the Chantry, which leads to a series of visits over the course of the fall semester in which he gets to know about her, Melissa and the rest of the Hawke family.





	Stopping By

There was no real reason for him to visit Leandra, save for the fact that he liked visiting her. Sebastian spent so much time drinking tea at her table his senior year, he wondered how he had gotten by without it. Leandra was an excellent listener.

It had started with a chance run-in at the Chantry, she was praying and he was leaving after talking to Elthina and doing a hefty amount of yard work. He didn't mind it, to be honest, he liked being outside and he'd never known how to do it before he came to Kirkwall, which made the novelty of it still relatively new. He'd almost passed her but Leandra called out to him, waving even as he wiped his sweaty, dusty face on the hem of his none-too-clean t-shirt.

"Please come by and visit sometime, even without Melissa," she'd urged, and he'd taken her up on it.

He'd seen her at the Chantry before, not that he was there so much to keep track, but he'd seen her before he knew her. Once he'd recognized her from Melissa's photos, from the way she looked and didn't look like her daughter, from the long greying dreadlocks that hung down her back and the way they'd called her Lady Amell even when it hadn't been her title to use. Sebastian had known her, saw her but never said anything. The vast reserves of charm he normally called upon fled because he wasn't sure if she wanted to know him. He knew what they said about him, not that Elthina allowed it to be mentioned here in the Chantry, but it was told as fact in so many other places.

When he had met her, Leandra hadn't indicated that she cared about such things. Neither had Melissa, when he'd confessed about his past, tried to straighten out some of the misinformation about him and all the many and varied things he'd done. There were so many. Maker knew he had done things he couldn't even remember, and none of it could be described any more generously than self-serving. He hadn't been a kind young man, not really, the rumors reflected the truth of his callousness. If her mother knew, he never heard tale of Leandra mentioning it to Melissa.

When she invited him, he felt like he should go, at least once. He brought flowers the first time, just because he didn't know what else to bring. The apartment where she lived was awful; cramped, at the whims of temperature and filthy despite some valiant attempts to clean it, but Sebastian still visited anyway. Each time he came he marveled that they had survived, four people, stuck in such tight quarters and with no place else to go, no way out.

Melissa told him that she worked to get out of the way of everyone else, and went to the library a lot to study before she got accepted to Tech. She took the tests for credits the extremely difficult tests that grant course credit by being some of the most difficult and comprehensive tests ever. She'd passed all of them and transferred in what few credits she did have and started as a second-semester sophomore. If she hadn't taken the time to get a minor in economics, she would have graduated sooner. There's been little but work in her past, and while Sebastian is in awe of her, he worries that one day it will all catch up to her. He wonders about the things Melissa doesn't tell him about her past, the ones she doesn't even tell Isabela. His curiosity and much more are part of the reason for his visits.

The apartment was awful, and yet he went there over happily.

She was his girlfriend's mother, and he couldn't not see the connection as a mother figure, though he didn't like to scrutinize the relationship too closely. She was his almost mother-in-law or something equivalent.

When he got there, she made him a cake in a mug and laughed as he talked about the pledges at KSE, how they held a date auction for their philanthropy event and raised about two thousand royals for their trouble. She was kind and listened in a way that his own mother never quite managed, and talked about Carver and Bethany a little, Gamlen a lot, and Melissa not at all until he asked. Once he asked about Melissa, Leandra asked, gently, about his own family.

They had a lot to talk about.

#

"What was Melissa like when she was young?" he asked, a glass of iced tea in his hands. It was autumn, but still too warm for hot tea. She gave him iced tea and cakes, and he saw the vestiges of her proper upbringing in it. The cake was made of soft, thin layers, drizzled with honey icing. Sebastian took a bite as he waited for her to answer.

"Younger. I don't mean that to be funny, I mean she was younger, more carefree. She laughed more, but she was always independent. So determined to do things on her own, and figure out how the world worked on her terms."

"How so?"

Leandra sat down her own glass of iced tea on the table, and Sebastian saw it was nearly empty. He got up to retrieve the pitcher as she thought, and she thanked him absently as she collected her memories.

"Bethany and Carver spent time following us around, attached to us or each other. Bethany was glued to her father, and Carver stayed on my skirts. Melissa never did. She spent time with us, but it was if she wanted it to be in equal measure, and not more than the time she spent alone, learning things. When she was very young, she used to tell us what she did and saw, but she stopped doing that when we moved from the north to down past Lake Calenhad. She was about six or seven. It's been a long time since Melissa confided in me."

Sebastian nodded, understanding. "She has to figure things out on her own, I've found." Then he shifted, suddenly discomfited. "I didn't meant to spend our visit just asking about Melissa, my lady. I am here to visit you."

She laughed then, a merry, soft laugh that reminded him, inexplicably, of spring. "Oh Sebastian, you are so very charming, with your courtiers manners. It's been many years since I've been a lady or anything else but myself. You can call me Leandra."

He smiled at her, his warmth and sincerity evident. Her own smile answered, her dark brown eyes bright with laughter as he leaned forward and took up another piece of cake. "Leandra then."

"That's what friends do, and I had hoped that I would be friends with all of the people my children are with."

"You've thought about it?" he asked, curious.

"Oh yes. They are grown now, and I have this space and time, to hope and wonder. It's a strange time, when your children are grown but they aren't quite at the stage of having children of their own yet." Leandra steepled her hands as she spoke about it, but didn't set her elbows on the table. Sebastian had that habit trained out of him too, and he recognized the signs of a strict governess, though his parents hadn't managed to keep his for very long.

"You want to be a grandmother?" he asked, knowing that he was wading into perilous waters.

"Eventually," she said, and gave him a sidelong look that had nothing to do with wanting grandchildren and everything to do with warning him against making any. He shrank a little under that look. "I meant more that it's a strange point in my life, not to force my changes onto them. Though grandchildren would be lovely. Of all of them, I thought it would be Carver first, but no." Her glance went to the mantle, where a photo of her family sat framed. He looked up at it too, seeing a younger version of the Hawkes he knew and the patriarch he'd never met.

"You've thought a lot about this," he said.

"I have a lot of time on my own. It's easier to think when that's all you can do. It makes my past mistakes sit heavier on my shoulders."

"I know how it is," he said softly.

It was time for him to leave after he finished his cake, but Sebastian promised to come back soon. He felt like they had so much more to talk about, but he'd have to tell Melissa first. He'd neglected to mention he was visiting today, and she'd find out from her mother if he didn't tell her first.

#

"Do you still speak with your parents?" Leandra asked him.

This time, apparently, it was his turn to answer questions. The days had turned colder since his first visit, and he was offered the appropriate shortbread and hot tea this time as he entered. It was going to rain at any moment, and Sebastian had just beat the beginning of it when he came into the apartment. It was warm inside, pleasant and not stifling for once and smelled like cinnamon and sugar. When he came in Sebastian found Leandra taking a break from sewing with baking.

He walked past her library books on the side table and sat down, and turned to put the kettle on for them. Sebastian was seated with a plate of shortbread when she asked him, his mouth full of buttery crumbles of cookie. That was when she asked about his parents.

"I do, though not frequently. They're both busy, and I have school, KSE and Melissa," he said.

"Have you seen them? You aren't allowed back, but surely they must come see you." Leandra looked concerned as she poured him a cup of tea, bringing the milk and sugar for him to add himself. Sebastian took his time in doing so, framing his answer into something that was the truth, but more palatable. He wasn't sure he could find a way to bend the truth to make it more palatable, even to banish some of the concern in Leandra's eyes.

"It's true, I'm not allowed to return home right now, but my father visited last fall. My mother used to come on her way to Orlais at the beginning of fashion week in the spring, but I didn't see her this year." Sebastian watched her reaction as he told her, and in that moment she made a face so like the ones he'd seen Bethany make he almost laughed.

Leandra and Bethany looked a great deal alike, moreso than Leandra and Melissa. Now and then he caught glimpses of Melissa in her mother, but overall Melissa seemed more Hawke than Amell to his eyes. He hadn't spent very much time with Carver, and hadn't picked up on his mannerisms, didn't remember the details of him physically, but more of his personality. Carver was just overwhelmingly large, tall and broad and muscular, but Sebastian couldn't exactly remember if he looked like Leandra at all or not.

Leandra however was smaller and thinner than Bethany, though curvier than Melissa. Her face bore lines his mother would never allow to manifest on her visage, even with as much as she railed against the _ghastly_ face lifts of others. Her hair, which had looked darker even a few months ago when they'd met, was turning mostly grey at the roots. None of this dimmed the intensity of her scrutiny, and she was still frowning when he turned his attention back to her.

"Your mother hasn't seen you in over a year?" Leandra asked, and though he'd expected her tone to be accusatory, it wasn't. It was just sad, pained almost, as if it hurt her by extension, the thought of not seeing a child for over a year.

"No." Sebastian sighed and sat back, wondering how best to put it. "Leandra, I know my parents love me, but they're not great at it."

"My mother told me that it was my life to ruin when I married my husband. We had eighteen wonderful years together I wouldn't trade for anything, not even the ease of being a noble in Kirkwall. I only wish we'd had more time together, but my parents didn't even want us to have the time we got. We had to take it, you know, to make our lives our own, which my mother was convinced was a gigantic mistake." She sighed, recalling the memories but not bothering to share them with him. "Sometimes the people who love you can't see you clearly."

Deep within him, he hoped she was right. He still hadn't learned quite how to make his life his own. Sebastian fervently and desperately hoped that his parents hadn't seen him clearly, had never known who he was. That would mean that they were unreasonable with this exile and all of the deals they tried to offer him, all of the disapproval they lavished on him for even the slightest transgression once he'd entered Tech, even though for years before they ignored him and his behavior. He hoped that he was as good as the man Melissa saw, the one the Grand Cleric Elthina told him he could choose to be.

"I think we all have difficulty when it comes to seeing the people we love," he said, thinking of the way his mother, never good at discipline, still doted on his brothers. Not him, not like she did with them.

"I see nothing for them to be ashamed of, whatever your past Sebastian. You're a wonderful young man. Remember that."

He smiled across the table at her, grateful that she saw something in him to be proud of.

#

"I saw this and thought of you," Sebastian told her. "It was in a shop in Hightown."

He was never good at giving gifts, at least not in the way his family wanted him to be. His mother always smiled, but she never wore any of his gifts, never wanted them. He never saw anything more of them after the initial giving. Sebastian only realized he was bad at it when he was a teenager, when even his mother stopped pretending and told him to just ask her secretary to get her something like his brothers did.

His ineptitude at gift giving caused him a moment of mild panic with the end of the year approaching and Satinalia gifts were expected. He hadn't been dating Melissa last year, and hadn't given a Satinalia gift in years. Since he'd been exiled, he hadn't bothered to buy any, and spent his holidays at the Chantry. He hadn't even sent cards, but it wasn't like he got any in return either.

"Sebastian, you're so sweet. Thank you, this is wonderful," Leandra said. He looked for the insincerity he was expecting, the shifting of her eyes or too purposeful eye contact, but instead she just leaned forward and hugged him.

She took her sewing machine maitenence supplies over to the table where her machine sat and put it down next to it. "I always need to take care of my machine, otherwise I'll wind up spending half my income on servicing. Oh good, I need a new cover and this set has one. Where did you find this? I have been looking all over for a set like this and the shop nearby didn't have any."

"It was at Darnee's Sewing Place, in Hightown Square. It's near the corner that leads to the Merchant's Guild."

"I know where that is. I'll look for it next time I'm up that way."

He had a seat at the table and Leandra brought him out a mug of tea and lemon poppy seed bread. When she sat down across from him, she beamed at him, and Sebastian felt his face flush with pleasure. Leandra liked the gift. She liked his visits, the cake was proof. She said she'd make it for him after he'd mentioned it being a favorite last time he visited, but he hadn't expected her to actually remember.

That afternoon was an easy talk about nothing important and a little bit of everything. After he gave her the gift, they didn't talk about much about any one topic, but rather spent their time just chatting. She talked about fashion, about going to Starkhaven a few times in her youth, about the Chantry and asked how his volunteer work there went. He spoke of going to university in Orlais for his first year, about learning to drive and his grandfather, whom Leandra remembered. They talked about nothing in particular most of the time, mentioning things and delving into stories when they were relevant, and it was only when Bethany came home did he realize he'd spent all afternoon at the apartment.

#

"Have you thought about the future? Leandra asked, sipping on her tea.

"I'm glad you asked," Sebastian said, leaning forward in his chair. "I've been thinking about buying an apartment." Palpable excitement rolled off of him in waves and he grinned at her. This project had been foremost in his thoughts.

"Buying? Not renting?" she asked.

"No, I'd rather just have my own apartment space. There's a building in the Grasslands, you know the area?" he asked, and she nodded.

It was what the area between downtown and Hightown was called, because there used to be grass growing there, fields of it until the space was deemed useful. Perhaps when Kirkwall was founded the area was used a pasture of some kind, though it had just been grassland for decades until it wasn't, but the name stuck. Once the Grassland neighborhood had been the height of fashionable, but then it had come on an inevitable decline. It was once again up and coming, and he was already having his lawyer draw up papers to make an offer on a two-story building there. Retail space on the bottom, offices on the top, and a small parking lot in the back. Except it wouldn't be offices, but rather one large apartment for himself and retail rentals down below.

He'd thought about it in detail after talking with his father about staying in Kirkwall. He needed a secure place, one where he and his reinstated security team could coexist peacefully, but he also wanted a quiet place of his own. Living in the KSE house for all these years had been exciting, it gave him a sense of brotherhood he'd never had growing up, but he was ready for his own place again.

A place where he could spend time alone with Melissa. He hadn't shown it to her yet, but mostly because he'd only walked through twice himself. When he'd mentioned real estate to her, she hadn't any advice or knowledge to offer him. She only said that she liked the Grasslands as a neighborhood when she first came to Kirkwall, but she and Isabela had chosen an apartment closer to Tech and where Bela could see the water.

"I found a building there for sale, nothing too big, but a decent amount of space," he said, turning his mind back to the conversation. He described the building for her, laying out what he had in mind, to take it from the small offices on the top floor to apartments for him and his security detail. "Since once I graduate the press will be free to photograph and follow me again, so my security team will be back. I'd rather have a place I know is secure from the ground up rather than one I merely hope we can make safe."

"That sounds wise. I hadn't realized you were shielded from the press as you went to school. That must be a relief, though it is difficult to think of the end coming so soon. Are you able to do all of that with the building? Make it into an apartment, I mean?" she asked.

"Oh yes, if the sale goes through, renovation will start immediately and hopefully I'll get retail tenants in there before I graduate."

"You've thought this through," Leandra mused, smiling at him over her cup of tea.

"I've thought about the way I'd like my future to be and how I can shape it. I don't think I want to go back to Starkhaven, and though I haven't talked about it with Melissa in any great detail, she wants to be here. I think it would hurt her to leave another home."

"It would now, but in the future, she will feel less attached to Kirkwall. She worked so hard to keep us together for years, but now that we are more secure it's natural that we grow apart. My children need to explore their own lives, though I am glad that they are so close. I worry that she has a hard time with it, but she never says anything about it. I know both girls miss Carver a great deal."

"Does he call?"

"When he can," Leandra said, sighing. "It's not often enough. He writes, but I never feel like that's enough either. It's hard learning to live without them around me, but I know in my heart it's for the best."

"How is Bethany?" he asked. Leandra noticed his plate was empty and got more cookies for him before answering.

"Overall I think she's doing well. She isn't quite as scattered as she was over the spring and summer, thank the Maker. I think school has helped her settle. Even if healing isn't something she wants to do long-term, it's a good job for a mage and she won't have to worry so much about employment after she graduates."

They subsided into silence, then she asked him brightly about school, listening more attentively to him go on about his classes than was necessary. She couldn't have been that engrossed in his talk of project management, but she listened and asked more questions about his life than either of his parents had in their last two conversations combined.

#

"Forgive me if this is too much, but I wanted to ask you a question. Are you happy?" he asked her, and for once, Leandra looked taken aback by his question. He hadn't meant to be so impertinent, but he was looking at her, the dark circles under her eyes and the way she looked more worried, not less, during each of his visits. She'd given him no reason to believe she wasn't happy, but he wanted to hear from her about it.

"As much as I can be," she replied, and gave him a sad smile. "I miss Malcolm, but I'm not ready to be with him yet. Maybe one day, but I rather like being around my children and back in Kirkwall. It isn't the way I was expecting it to be, but things never really are."

"Are you?" she asked, and Sebastian nodded.

"I think so, or rather, I mean I hope this is what happy can be. Content, fulfilled with my school and work, in a good relationship. For a long time I didn't feel like the future mattered, and I didn't have any plans. Now, I do and in just over half a year I'll have graduated. It feels like for the first time, I can choose options that are to my liking," he said.

"You've thought a lot about the future. With any upcoming job and your apartment building, you're already making a life for yourself in Kirkwall after graduation. Do you have a job already?" she asked.

"I worked for the Viscounty this summer, and they've asked me back, but there are other places to interview with once graduation draws nearer. After the grades come out for the first term, more firms will try to schedule interviews."

"Is that happening for Melissa? Is she happy too?" Leandra asked, real concern making her frown unconsciously. "You didn't mention her in your plans for the future."

"Because I haven't really talked with her about them yet, and I wouldn't presume. She knows my purchase of the Grasslands building went through, and that I'm planning to live in Kirkwall. And as for her prospects for jobs, she has an offer from the place where she did her internship as well, and lots of interested notes from other places." He laughed, thinking of the way she dismissed almost all of them, preferring to wait until at least the spring to 'get mired in this job bullshit'. "But never doubt that she's central to my happiness, and the future plans, at least they way I've thought of them so far."

"You're very considerate of her," Leandra remarked, looking pleased. He felt a surge of pride at the look she was giving him and sat up straighter. It was chilly in the apartment today, the cool air coming through the window cooled the warmth that usually resided in the walls. A half-sewn costume of some sort was laying carefully folded on the couch, as was a heavy wool in beige and cream plaid pattern.

"She's been more than considerate with me, especially about my past and hang ups." He looked back at the pile and Leandra nodded at it.

"It's a coat, or it will be. Melissa's coat, she picked out the wool, asked me to make her a new winter coat. That's the lining over there." She pointed to a pile of beige fabric on her ironing board, ready to be pressed. She paused and then fixed him with a look, unwilling to let their previous subject drop. "You always talk about your past as if it holds you back."

"It's hard to escape from, even if it isn't actively holding me back anymore. I'm not sure I can completely be free of it," he admitted.

"I don't think we need to be free of our pasts to make a new start," Leandra told him. "We just need to want to have a better future."

"You sound like Melissa," he said and grinned at her. "I shouldn't be surprised."

"We're both optimists, in our way. We've had to be," Leandra told him. She got up then and stretched her legs. "Are you still hungry? I could make you some lunch. A sandwich, maybe or something more."

Sebastian wasn't, and he decided to leave her to her sewing and go back to school, though he wanted to stay longer. There were times when Leandra didn't like her solitude interrupted, which was why he always texted to ask her before he came over. He understood the novelty of it, the delight and how nice it was to have company that only stayed for a short time. He hoped that one day he could return the favor to her and be her host for once, instead always the guest.

#

It was snowing the next time he came, and she asked him to take her to the grocery store, if he didn't mind. Sebastian didn't, and he was glad to do it, though he should have dressed more appropriately. He was still in his gym clothes, and though they were great at keeping him warm and dry as he trained, he wasn't generating the same amount of body heat when he wasn't, and they left him cold.

He took her to the store in his car, and Leandra happily chattered away at him. She spoke of the future -- her last date with the magistrates was scheduled for the next day, and it was a mere formality. She would finally reclaim her title and rightful home after years in abeyance.

"Would you marry Melissa, now that she'll have her proper title?" Leandra asked him, and it took everything in him not to swerve the car.

"That's not an easy question to answer," he told her, sparring her a glance. "She doesn't know what it means to be with me when I am not protected from the press or exiled and not expected to perform duties for the crown."

"And you worry that it would change your relationship?"

"I'm not sure if it will, but I think about it often," he admitted. "It's not easy to bear responsibility and scrutiny at the same time. I was horrible at it. She may not want to be married to me because of all the expectations that come with it, regardless of how we both feel. But if it were just up to the way I feel, I would."

"Those are careful answers," Leandra said and got out of the car. It was snowing an early, heavy snow. Fluffy white flakes obscured the window and the lines of the parking space. He pulled on his hood as he got out of the car.

They didn't speak about it again until they'd gotten the cart, and Leandra let Sebastian push it, at his request. Grocery shopping was one of his favorite things to do, but Melissa hated coming with him. She made lists, clipped coupons and watched for sales. Sebastian bought what looked nice and had to go back at least twice after he'd forgotten something he actually needed in favor of buying something he wanted, like two different flavors of cheesecake bars.

"Melissa is careful too, cautious. I will always resent the way things turned for us, the life that took her from being a child to a very cautious woman far too soon. I had my part in it, I know, but there were so many other things that led to it," she sighed and turned to pick up a box of crackers before coming back to where he stood with the cart, "I just don't know."

"I don't think Melissa wants to get married, Leandra."

"No, she probably doesn't," Leandra conceded. "Not even to you. But that's because of the way she feels about responsibility and not being a burden more than her not wanting to be married."

Sebastian made a face, thinking about that. He wasn't sure what she meant, so he asked her to clarify. "Help me understand what you mean about Melissa," he said to her, and then went to get a bag of potatoes for her.

"If you married her, the difference in your wealth and hers would make her uncomfortable. You would always pay and she would always feel like she was being taken care of. Even as a small girl, she didn't like to be taken care of. I found her hiding more scraped knees and bruises because she just didn't want to tell us about them, she didn't want us to worry. Malcolm healed them all when he knew, and later, he just would walk up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder and send a healing spell down her just in case. It was like a joke between them, after a while."

"So it's money?" he asked, but she shook her head.

"Money's just the most obvious culprit. What do you two talk about together? I don't mean your secrets, I just mean in general."

He shrugged as he answered, dredging his mind for the more innocuous topics they managed to talk about. What they talked about in private was sex, though they hadn't yet slept together. He still had to become comfortable with it in their relationship, and they wound up talking about it a lot. There was much to say, to describe, to fantasize about and share, and Sebastian had to fully steer his mind away from those memories before he could answer. Distractedly, he put his hand into the a freezer of frozen vegetables before remembering she'd asked him for desserts not veggies.

"People we know and classes. Our pasts, mostly," he admitted and then went on, "and books. She reads a great deal when she isn't too busy with work, and I try to keep up."

"I'm glad you said books," Leandra said. "Because otherwise I'd be worried that you two only had school in common. She's always been curious, and so, so smart we barely knew what to do with her. She can name every constellation in the night sky, did you know that?"

"No, I didn't."

Leandra smiled fondly, her mind someplace else as she looked over the diary section. "I think she would marry you, if you asked, eventually. She needs an equal, as do we all. But equal for Melissa means understanding everything that made her her, and knowing that even though she doesn't mean to, she thinks in numbers. Your wealth makes things unequal and she must balance it out before it can sit right with her."

"Like an equation," he muttered and Leandra gave him a searching look. She had the same eyes as Melissa, and Sebastian was caught for a moment seeing all the similarities between the two of them.

"I have no idea if that's true, but you seem to understand. Come on, we're almost done here," she said.

"I need to get hot chocolate," he told her, and she smiled at him.

"Sweet tooth?" she asked, and he nodded.

He paid for it all, because he knew what she meant about inequalities. Leandra put up a token protest but let him in the end, and Sebastian thought he almost understood why.

#

"Mother said you came to visit her today." Melissa smiled up at him from across the table where they were studying in the student union. She took off the beige and white checked coat he'd seen Leandra preparing to make a few weeks back. "What did you two do?"

"We went to the store. It was snowing pretty hard then, so I drove her," Sebastian said. "Is it still snowing?"

"It was when I came in. You've been here since then?" she asked and he nodded.

He'd left Leandra after helping her put away her food. She'd told him she needed a nap, yawning as she turned on the tv to add noise to the empty house. Bethany was going to be home from work at six, and Leandra would be up by then with dinner made. Melissa was supposed to come by on Saturday, but had tutoring today in the math building. He didn't really have much to do after that but think.

The KSE house wasn't good for solitude, and he'd needed and wanted to think. The future wasn't unwritten, he was shaping it right now. He looked up at Melissa, who'd come in and kissed him in greeting then opened her books and started working. She hadn't tried for conversation, but Sebastian knew she would when she was ready or got bored, whichever came first.

"Where's Bela?" he asked.

"Not sure. She said something to me about going to Amaranthine for the weekend. She might already be gone to Ferelden."

"Does she always flit around like that?" he asked, but Sebastian knew what the answer would be.

"Yes. It's her way. Although I miss her when she's not in the apartment, the occasional absence and ensuing silence is always a nice contrast."

He laughed, though he was sure she hadn't meant for it to be funny. Sebastian looked up at her, watching as she took a swig from her water bottle. Sebastian saw her mother in her, and the differences between them. Their relationship wasn't always easy, he knew that from listening to Leandra, but they both worked at it. Melissa went over whenever she could, talked to her mom on the phone, texted her. His mother hadn't even answered his last email.

Sebastian loved his mom, truly, adoringly, the way he had when he was a boy, but spending time with Leandra showed him that something was missing from the relationship. For years he'd tried so hard to be good, to be perfect, so she would pay attention, and later he was so very disappointing that she was forced to pay attention to him. Melissa and Leandra never had to resort to such lengths to be important to each other, and he was almost jealous. He wanted what they had, but he could settle for having it with Leandra. His mother would likely never change, never stop doting too much on grown men, indulging his father even when he was cruel and serving her own interests first, but he could still love her.

"Leandra invited me for dinner tomorrow. Were you planning to go?" he asked, and Melissa smiled at him.

"Of course. Can't miss my weekly meal with Mother. If you're going too, I won't take the bus over."

He grinned back at her. "You could stay with me tonight, skip all the in-between steps."

"I just told you my roommate was out of the country for the weekend and you want me to stay with you at your communal house," she pointed out.

He thought about the quiet they'd have together, the two of them watching the snow fall tonight. Then he looked up at Melissa and nodded. "I bought hot chocolate at the store with your mom. It's in my bag."

"I love it when you're prepared," she said and leaned across the table to kiss his nose. He closed his eyes and accepted it, smiling as he did.

"Liss, we should talk about the future. After graduation," he said, but she shook her head.

"Not you too. Come on, if we're doing this, we'd better leave."

"Who else has asked?"

"Mother. I thought that was your doing. She asked after you'd visited, talking about jobs and interviews and fall semester grades and all of that. Or was it the other way around?"

He laughed, he couldn't help it and Melissa made a sour face. Sebastian packed up his bag, slid on his coat and took her hand. "We don't have to talk about it tonight," he told her. He didn't much want to talk about anything to be honest, he just wanted to think. She'd understand when they got back to her apartment and he explained it to her. She always did.


End file.
